“All the more reason to leave it a time or two.” He stepped forward and took me by the shoulders, his eager face pleading along with his words. “Trust me, won’t you?”
I stiffened against his touch. “Why should I?”
“Because when a lady asks for my help, I aim to give it properly.” Keeping his gaze on me, he unhooked a wooden bar hanging on long ropes and tossed it over. “Now, let’s start, shall we?” His look was challenging.
I gripped the bar and tugged. “You don’t truly expect me to swing through the air on this contraption, do you? How will that help me dance?”
“What you’ve done isn’t working, is it? I aim to give you new experiences, push you off a few of your precious safety ledges. Now hold on.”
“But I’m afraid of—”
“I said,hold on.”
...heights.
A gentle shove against my back and I was hurtling through open space, high over the straw-covered floors. I clutched that awful bar for dear life, digging my fingernails into the wood. I squeezed my eyes shut as I sailed through the air, then I forced one eyelid open. Another platform rose up to meet me, and I scrambled to get my feet onto it, but as my shoes touched wood,my weight pulled me back down. I trembled on the swing back, until I felt solid hands around my waist.
Jack hauled me onto the loft and steadied me. “Now you know what it feels like to fly.”
“I could have lived without the knowledge.” I had become pudding.
“Lived, yes, but not danced. Not well, at least. You’re so stiff, so grounded. Every good dancer should know what it is to be weightless.”
“I’ve no desire to perform dangerous stunts.”
“A bit of circus advice for you.” He leaned on a pole. “The only way you’ll go far is to leap big. You may fly or you may fall, but either way, everyone will be looking at you.”
I folded my arms over my chest and glared at him. “I have no interest in making leaps of any sort. You and your fanciful—”
Palms out, he gave me a light shove. I wasn’t holding the bar. I flailed, tilted, and plummeted straight down with a cry, my long hair curtaining everything from view. How very long it took to fall. Hundreds of fears had time to surface as I plummeted through empty air, heart pounding double time with the passing seconds.
Thwack.I landed on a deep pile of straw and tumbled legs over head down its side, gasping for breath. My heart still hammered as I stood, brushing the itchy straw from my clothes, my hair. The elephant shuffled in his stall down the way and gave a small trumpet, as if laughing at me. Panic turned to surging anger as I straightened and looked up at Jack, who watched with hands on his hips. “There now, was that so terrible?”
I grasped the rail and marched all the way back up those steps and across the loft. “What on earth was that for?”
“Shall we try the trapeze again?”
“Are you mad? I’ve already had a spill. I wouldn’t go near—”
Oomph. Another shove, and I was sailing over the edge, arms flailing. Again I struck the straw, rump first, and tucked my limbs for the roll down the hill that was becoming far too familiar. Sprawled on the barn floor, I glared up at him. Words evaporated off the surface of my burning anger.
I’d have lain there far longer, firmly on that solid ground, except for a female giggle nearby that jolted my senses. Lizzie watched me from the shadows under the lower loft where she lounged in the straw, sewing a glittery costume. Her smile snapped with a vindictive flavor of glee, and I shot up, unwilling to let her see me downed for a moment longer. Once again I marched up those loft steps to have it out with my foolish trainer in private, to demand he return me to London, but when I reached the top, he grabbed me by the shoulders.
“That was marvelous. First-rate work.”
“You truly are mad.”
“No, no, the way you fell. It was splendid.”
I eyed him with a bit of confusion.
“There was far more grace involved in that little spill, as you call it, than the first one.”
“Thanks to you, I had a bit of practice.”
His grin stretched his face. “A dancer can fall with as much grace as she dances, if she learns how.”
“I’d rather concentrate onnotfalling.”
